Restless French alternative carrier Iliad has expressed an interest in acquiring France’s fourth and last UMTS licence (for an idea of the group’s other ambitions click here). The would-be quad-play service provider is not, however, committing to pursuing the acquisition, pointing out that the French regulator the Autorité de Régulation des Communications Electroniques et des Postes (ARCEP) has not yet disclosed the procedure to be followed to award the licence.

In a statement the Iliad Group also said: “Iliad will observe with interest the procedure which ARCEP will put into place during 2007 for the granting of this licence and would like to highlight the fact that arrangements will have to be made to guarantee the viability of any new entrant, thereby encouraging the development of competition in the mobile market in the interest of consumers.”

Iliad’s IFW subsidiary has a nationwide WiMAX licence that once belonged to Neuf Télécom. Earlier this year Iliad expressed interest in developing services based on the IEEE 802.16e mobile version of WIMAX, and the company now says it will continue with its WiMAX network roll-out and plans.

Reports suggest that there is at least one other potential candidate for the fourth licence – CATV operator Noos-Numericable. France’s existing three 3G networks are operated by Orange, Bouygues Telecom and SFR.

In other related French 3G news, ARCEP is currently digesting the results of a public consultation concerning the re-use of the 900 and 1,800MHz frequencies to deploy third-generation mobile networks. Both Orange and SFR have apparently made requests to use those frequencies, a development that prompted ARCEP to solicit interest in the fourth 3G licence in the first place.
John Williamson